


the heart pulls both ways

by illimerence



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Polyamorous Character, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2019-09-16
Packaged: 2020-10-19 14:24:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20658713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/illimerence/pseuds/illimerence
Summary: In which Dorian is in love with Lavellan, Dorian is falling for the Iron Bull, and there is no way this can end without a broken heart. Right?





	the heart pulls both ways

“So,” Mahanon says later that night, when they’re both sweaty and sated between the sheets of his bed. The fireplace is burning low, and there’s a mostly-full bottle of brandy next to two glasses on Mahanon’s desk, something left over from that evening’s ‘something interesting.’ “The Iron Bull.”

Dorian’s heart flips over in his chest. Why now? Why do they have to have this conversation now? He’s so warm and satisfied and all he wants is to fall asleep in his Inquisitor’s arms, and there’s no way this conversation can end well.

“What about him?” Dorian asks, his voice light. 

Mahanon has his arms crossed behind his head, his white-blond hair spread like a halo across the pillow. He’s gazing up at the ceiling, his eyes unfocused. “Why haven’t you two, yet?”

“I’m quite sure I don’t know what you mean,” Dorian says, sitting up. He absolutely does know what Mahanon means, though. The Bull’s been flirting with him since the moment they met, in the Redcliffe Chantry all lit up green from the rift, and Dorian – well, he’s been flirting back, hasn’t he?

The Bull had called him pretty, and Dorian had called him suspicious, and since then it’s been all push and pull, with the Bull pushing just hard enough to keep Dorian interested, toeing the line of ‘too far’ but never actually crossing it, and sending Dorian stumbling for the right words, tripping over his tongue like he hasn’t since he was a teenager.

With Mahanon it was easy: show off a little, call him ‘strapping’ and ‘handsome,’ let him make all the first moves. When they’d finally fallen into bed together it was like they’d been doing this all along. 

But the Bull, he’s difficult. Dorian never knows where he stands. Is the Bull going to make a dirty joke about Dorian’s ‘staff,’ or psychoanalyse him in front of the whole party? Does he actually mean what he says, or does he just want to make Dorian blush? He flirts with everyone, but none so often and with such palpable glee as Dorian.

Just this morning on the road back to Skyhold the Bull had growled something filthy involving ‘pinning’ and ‘gripping’ and ‘conquering,’ and Mahanon, traitor that he is, had laughed helplessly at Dorian’s slack jaw and pink cheeks.

“Come on, Dorian,” Mahanon says, turning onto his side and propping himself up on one elbow. “You could cut the sexual tension between the two of you with a dagger.”

“I,” Dorian starts, “I don’t – that is –“

“You almost fell off your horse when he propositioned you today,” Mahanon points out.

“That wasn’t – he wasn’t propositioning me,” Dorian tries, but Mahanon’s not finished.

“Remember our last visit to the Forbidden Oasis?”

Does Dorian ever. They’d been walking in circles for hours, trying to find paths up vertical rock face after vertical rock face to retrieve even more of those Maker-forsaken shards. The whole party were sticky and hot and had sand in places no one should ever have sand, and with the giant having been dealt with on the initial scouting mission several months earlier, the Intrinsic Pool had been more than inviting after their return to camp.

Both Sera and the Bull had stripped down immediately and entirely, and Dorian had quite forgotten himself, frozen in place and unable to look away from the Bull’s… assets.

“You couldn’t stop staring,” Mahanon continues. “You should have seen yourself, it was like you were having a religious experience.”

“That’s not – I could have been staring at anything.”

“Like Sera’s bony ass? Look, I know you,” Mahanon says softly, “and I know the way you look at Bull. It’s the same way you look at me.”

Dorian feels the shame coil in his gut. It’s true. He’d tried to ignore it, once it was clear that he and Mahanon were heading for something more than just the physical: the way his stomach twists when he sees the Bull, the warmth that curls in his chest when they talk.  
He feels selfish, greedy. He already has something wonderful with Mahanon. Why does his body insist on drawing him towards the Bull as well?

It’s not that his feelings for Mahanon are any less than they are for the Bull. When he sees Mahanon from the library window, going back and forth between the stables, the Herald’s Rest, Cullen’s office on the battlements, heat fills his heart at the sight of him. When they talk, Mahanon’s eyes on him make him feel like the most important man in Thedas; when they’re alone together, whether they’re walking arm in arm along the battlements or giggling together in the wine cellar, or else in bed, Dorian feels utterly satisfied, like everything in his life was leading him here, to Mahanon.

But still, he thinks of the Bull.

Dorian looks down, away from Mahanon’s face. “I’m sorry,” he says.

“What for?” Mahanon sounds genuinely confused.

“About the Bull,” Dorian says. “You’re right. I do have feelings for him. And I’m sorry. But that doesn’t mean I don’t still feel the same way about you, and I promise you, I will never act on those feelings, as long as we’re together.”

There’s a long stretch of silence, one that seems to confirm Dorian’s worst fears. This is it, then. His first true relationship, the man he loves – over.

He feels Mahanon’s hand gentle on his arm. “Why not?” Mahanon asks.

Dorian looks up at him, incredulous. “What do you mean, ‘why not?’”

Mahanon frowns. “You’re attracted to the Bull. The Bull is obviously attracted to you. What’s the problem?”

“The – the problem is that I don’t want to lose you!” Dorian’s voice finally cracks on the word ‘lose,’ and he has to take a moment to compose himself. “How could you think that I would rather the Bull than you? I love you, Mahanon, I don’t want to – I can’t –“

Dorian is interrupted by Mahanon surging up to kiss him, his lips soft and certain and, more than anything, familiar against his own. Dorian hears himself make a pained noise somewhere deep in his throat.

“Don’t make me choose the Bull,” he whispers when Mahanon pulls away. “Don’t make me choose.”

“I love you too, _vhenan_,” Mahanon says. “I don’t want you to choose. You don’t _have_ to choose.”

Dorian lets out a short, sharp laugh, though to his ears it sounds more like a sob. “I don’t understand,” he says.

“I think I do,” Mahanon says. His hands are still on Dorian’s face, having landed there when he’d kissed him. “You humans have some really weird hang-ups about sex and love, you know that?”

“You may have mentioned it once or twice,” Dorian says, remembering the conversation they’d had after the first time they’d slept together. “Although I’d assumed we were talking about Tevinter, not humans in general.”

“Oh, Tevinter’s hang-ups are even worse than the rest,” Mahanon says. “At least most humans understand that two men or two women can be in love. But the idea that you can only love one person at a time? Barbaric. And don’t get me started on what humans think about gender.”

Dorian is still somewhat confused, even though Mahanon’s words had technically made sense. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Is this a lesson in Dalish culture? Do your people have multiple partners at once?”

“What I’m saying,” Mahanon says with a sort of fond exasperation, “is that I love you. And I want you to be happy. And if the Iron Bull makes you happy, I’d be more than fine with sharing your affections.”

Dorian takes a moment to process this. “Oh,” he says.

“Yes,” Mahanon says, “oh. Besides. I can’t exactly say that I haven’t thought about it, you with the Bull. He’s so… big. And you’re, well, you.”

“Oh,” Dorian says again. His mouth has gone dry in the way it often does when he gets aroused too quickly. “Do you supposed he’d want… both of us? At the same time?”

Mahanon laughs, the sound of it filling Dorian’s chest with light. “I doubt there’s much the Bull would say no to,” he says, grinning. Dorian grins too, all the weight gone from his shoulders.

“You should talk to him, tomorrow,” Mahanon says. “For now… I’ll admit, I wouldn’t mind another go.” He lays back on the bed, one arm behind his head again, smiling wryly up at him.

“I can’t say no to you,” Dorian says, and leans down to kiss him.


End file.
